Attitudes to the medical specialities: comparing pre-clinical students' perceptions of nine specialities

This study set out to compare pre-clinical (2nd year) and clinical (5th year) medical students' attitudes to nine specialities. Previous research using the questionnaire employed in this study revealed a large number of significant differences, particularly with regard to pre-clinical students' beliefs about and attitudes towards psychiatry, general practice and surgery. Both multivariate (factor analysis) and univariate (analysis of variance) analyses showed significance main effects for both group (2nd vs 5th years) and speciality but perhaps more importantly significant interactions. Both predispositional and socialization factors are used to account for the difference in students' attitudes and beliefs over time. The advantage of longitudinal over cross-sectional designs is also discussed.